MORE MYSTERIES
Of course, every one was highly elated at the successful outcome of
the ruse which Rawlins had suggested and all felt that at last the
long chase was over, that the leaders of the gang of “reds” were
prisoners under lock and key at Trinidad, and that soon the destroyer
would be homeward bound with her mission successfully accomplished.
And no one was more pleased at the outcome than Robinson, the chief
officer of the _Devonshire_. At the suggestion of the officials
in Dominica, it had been decided to keep him and his men on the
destroyer until definite news was received of his ship’s whereabouts
when, as he had pointed out to Mr. Pauling and Commander Disbrow, he
and his men could be put aboard the _Devonshire_ and could again
assume the duties which had been so tragically interrupted by the
rascals from the submarine. Moreover, as the Administrator of Dominica
had reminded Mr. Pauling, the presence of Robinson and his men would
be needed at whatever port the _Devonshire_ was held, in order to
identify the pirates and to testify to the facts.
And now, knowing that he would soon be back on his own ship and would
have an opportunity of telling his story to the British authorities
and would have the satisfaction of seeing the murderers of Captain
Masters and the radio operator receive their just punishment, Robinson
and his men were, if possible, more elated than Mr. Pauling and his
party.
“It means hangin’ for the bally blighters!” he declared. “Piracy
’twas--no less--and though I’ve never been to a hangin’ yet, it would
do me good to go to theirs--when I think of Captain Masters and poor
‘Sparks’ shot down in cold blood.”
“Yes, they richly deserve it,” agreed Mr. Pauling. “But I’m afraid
punishment for this crime will rob us of the chance to punish them for
the other crimes they have committed. However, it makes little
difference what government deals with them, I suppose.”
“Yes, you may be sure the British are not going to give them up,”
declared Mr. Henderson. “We may think our English cousins slow in some
things, but British laws and British justice are inexorable as well as
swift and these rascals will curse the day they ran their stolen ship
into a British port. Better for them had they given themselves up to
us.”
“I suppose we’d better send a message to Trinidad saying we’re coming
and have the _Devonshire’s_ crew and chief officer aboard,” said
Mr. Pauling. “I should have done it before. No need of cipher now.
Just see Bancroft, Rawlins, and give him this message.”
Presently the diver returned, a frown on his face. “He can’t send it,
Mr. Pauling,” he announced. “Something’s wrong with his instruments.
He says they went wrong just after we got the message this morning and
he can’t locate the trouble. Just as soon as he gets the things fixed,
he’ll shoot it off.”
“Too bad,” exclaimed Mr. Pauling, “but there’s really no hurry. Lucky
it didn’t happen when we had really important matters to send--for
example, when we notified the officials of the _Devonshire’s_
seizure.”
“And if he doesn’t get his set fixed, we can send with ours, when we
get nearer,” said Tom.
“To be sure!” assented his father. “I’d almost forgotten that--it’s
been so long since you boys were called upon.”
Interested as they were in everything pertaining to radio, the two
boys hurried to the radio room and found Bancroft busy at his
instruments and thoroughly exasperated.
“It’s just got my goat!” he exclaimed, as he glanced up at the boys’
arrival. “I never ran up against anything like it. I’ve been over the
antenna and the insulation, and I’ve worked back to the inductance and
the condensers. Everything seems ship-shape and yet the whole blamed
thing seems dead. Current’s all right, I’ve tried new tubes, and the
wave meter and ammeter tests are O. K. and yet I can’t get a blessed
reply.”
“Well, that doesn’t prove you’re not sending,” declared Tom. “How do
you know the trouble isn’t in the station you’re trying to get? Maybe
your messages are going out all right and they get them but can’t send
back.”
“Oh, I’m not such a boob as not to think of that!” retorted Bancroft.
“I’ve tried four different stations and not a reply from any. And the
radio compass is in the same fix. It’s downright uncanny, I tell you.
Look here! The filament oscillates and the ammeter registers and yet
I’ll bet there isn’t a wave going out. It’s just as if the thing were
short circuited somewhere, but I can swear it’s not. I’ve even hooked
up a whole new set.”
“Say, I’ve an idea to test it and be sure you’re not sending,” cried
Tom. “I’ll go over to the radio-compass and listen and you send and
see if I hear anything. Then I’ll send and see if you can hear. If
there’s even a trace of waves, we ought to get them at a few yards
away.”
“That’s a great scheme,” agreed Bancroft enthusiastically. “And say, I
wonder if your sets are all right.”
“We’ll try them too, after we do this,” said Tom as he left the room.
But Tom’s scheme was a dismal failure. Although the set at the radio
compass seemed in perfect working order, he could detect no sign of a
message from Bancroft’s instruments a few yards away and when: he
returned to the wireless room, Bancroft reported! that he had heard
nothing.
“Well, that does beat the Dutch,” declared Tom, “Now I’m going to test
our sets. Perhaps everything’s hoodooed. You go to the radio compass,
Frank, and Mr. Bancroft can stay here and I’ll go to our sets and
we’ll try to get some sound or to send. If they’re all dead, it must
be some atmospheric trouble. Perhaps the air’s full of electricity or
something.”
“Whew!” exclaimed Bancroft, “That gives me an idea! Perhaps it’s due
to that volcano over at Martinique--Mt. Pelee you know, the one that
destroyed St. Pierre. It’s still active and it’s only a few miles from
Dominica. If I could only get some dope from the station at Fort de
France I could find out.”
“I don’t know,” replied Tom. “I read somewhere that active volcanoes
did all sorts of queer things to ships’ compasses and if they affect
magnets, I don’t see why they shouldn’t affect radio instruments. But
if that’s it, then it’s mighty funny you got the message this
morning.”
“But I didn’t!” exclaimed Bancroft. “I haven’t received any message
since day before yesterday. That message your father got was a cable.”
“Gosh!” ejaculated Tom. “I thought all along it was a radio. I never
asked, but just took it for granted. Then you don’t know how long
these sets have been out of order?”
“Well, I know they were all right when we sent those messages off
after we picked up the _Devonshire’s_ boat,” replied Bancroft.
“Then perhaps it’s the volcano,” said Tom. “If it is, the sets will
work all right after we get farther away.”
“And we’ve forgotten something else,” put in Frank. “How can we tell
whether it’s the sending or receiving sets that have gone bad? Maybe
they all send and won’t receive or all receive and won’t send.”
“Why, of course that’s so,” assented Tom. “If it’s the same trouble
with all--the volcano or atmosphere or anything, then we may all be
sending but can’t receive. But you’re wrong, in a way, because we know
it must be in the receiving end anyway, or we’d hear some messages
from ships or shore even if they didn’t get ours. So if we’re not
sending, the things have gone wrong both ways. Well, I’m going to ours
now, so listen.”
It was now night, a dark, inky black night such as only occurs in the
tropics, with the darkness seeming to shut one in by a curtain and Tom
had actually to feel his way along the decks. The sea was fairly
smooth, and the destroyer, steadied by her swift rush through the
water, was making easy weather of it, and by the vibration of her hull
Tom knew that she was being driven at the greatest speed possible in
her still crippled condition. The decks seemed deserted, although Tom
knew that, hidden from view in the blackness, the watch was being kept
and once he glimpsed a dim, white, ghostly figure as it passed through
the rays of a running light forward and he heard faint voices from the
direction of the chart room and bridge. But somehow he had a peculiar
feeling of mystery or danger afoot and glanced nervously about. Then,
realizing how foolish he was, he shook off the childish fears of the
dark and reaching the stairs descended towards the little room where
he and Frank had installed their radio outfits.
The steel-walled, narrow alleyway was dimly lighted by screened
electric bulbs and reaching the door to the room, Tom turned the knob,
swung it open, and stepped into the black interior. With groping
fingers he reached for the switch beside the door and pressed the
button. At his touch the place was flooded with brilliant light and
dazed by the sudden glare Tom involuntarily turned his face and
blinked. The next instant the steel ceiling seemed to crash down upon
his head, his knees sagged limply, the light danced and spun about and
he felt himself sinking into a bottomless black pit.
Slowly consciousness came back to him. First, as a dull, throbbing
ache, then as a stabbing pain in his head and with the pain came the
dim memory of the blinding light, the blow and oblivion. What had
happened? What had fallen from above to strike him? Why was it so
dark? Why did he feel suffocating? Had the lights gone out? Was he
still pinned under the object which had hit him?
Perhaps, he thought, there had been an accident, a collision. Perhaps,
even now, the destroyer was sinking. He strove to turn his head, to
rise, and then, for the first time, he suddenly realized that his head
was enveloped in the heavy choking folds of a blanket, that his arms
were pinioned behind his back and with the discovery came the
terrifying knowledge that he had been struck by some one; stunned,
gagged, and bound by some enemy.
But, by whom? Who upon the destroyer could have done this? Who had
been hiding in the room and for what reason?
Choking for breath, still dazed from the blow on his head, frightened
and sick, feeling as if every breath under the smothering cloth must
be his last, Tom nevertheless thought of the others. The vessel and
his friends must be in danger; there must be mutiny afoot, and he
groaned to think that he could not warn the others; could not even cry
out. Then, suddenly he forgot all, forgot his aching dizzy head, his
gasping, choking lungs, his terror and his plight, for through the
folds of the blanket the sounds of a human voice came dimly to him.
And, as Tom’s straining ears caught the words, he could scarcely
believe he was not in a delirium. Terror froze the blood in his veins.
“Everything correct,” came faintly through the cloth. “We’ll fix the
gear so she’ll go on the rocks in the Bocas. Yes, all out of it but
this and I’ll fix this in a minute more. Oh, yes. Pretty near caught.
Fool boy bobbed up unexpectedly. Knocked him out. Oh, no, toss him
overboard presently. No, no trace.”
Then silence--and Tom, knowing his end was near, that in a few short
moments he would be cast, bound, gagged and helpless into the black
water, prayed for unconsciousness, prayed for oblivion that would end
his sufferings. But the very terror of his fate kept his mind active
and his senses alive, while each short, gasping breath he drew sent
surges of awful, crashing pain through his temples and he felt as
though his eyes were bulging from the sockets.
Then he felt himself roughly seized and being carried away bodily. He
knew that in another instant he would find himself falling, would feel
the cold waters close over him. Summoning all his fast ebbing
strength, he uttered a piercing scream and once more lost
consciousness.
Muffled by the blanket about his head, Tom’s last despairing cry could
not have been heard ten feet away; but it was enough. Less than ten
feet off, Sam the Bahaman was at that instant approaching the room,
passing through the alleyway. At the boy’s smothered cry, he leaped to
the door, flung it open and with a savage yell sprang at the figure
about to throw the apparently lifeless boy through the open gun port.
So swift and silent had been Sam’s response to Tom’s cry that the
negro’s yell was the first warning Tom’s captor had of the Bahaman’s
approach. Startled, taken utterly by surprise, he dropped the boy’s
body, whipped out a revolver and whirled about. But Sam, with head
lowered, had hurled himself like a catapult across the room. Before
the other could even aim his weapon, the negro’s head struck him
squarely in the stomach with the force of a battering ram. With a
gasping, awful gurgle the man doubled up and shot through the open gun
port into the sea. Sam, carried forward by his own momentum, grasped
the gun carriage and saved himself in the nick of time from plunging
into the water after the writhing body of his victim.
The Bahaman gave one glance through the open barbette at the racing,
black, foam-flecked waves and then, with a grin of satisfaction, he
sprang to Tom’s side, whipped off the blanket, and tore loose the
bonds about his wrists. Lifting the unconscious boy in his powerful
black arms, he raced with him to the deck and to the room where Tom’s
father and the others were chatting, all oblivious of the tragedy
which had taken place beneath their feet.
To their frenzied questions as they worked feverishly over Tom, Sam
could give but very vague and unsatisfactory replies. “Ah jus’ cotch
tha’ soun’ of tha’ young gen’man’s cry, Chief,” he told Mr. Pauling.
“An’ Ah knowed tha’ mus’ be trouble for he an’ burs’ into the room. An
Ah seed tha’ Englishman jus’ mekkin’ fo’ to heave he out the gun po’t,
Chief.”
“Englishman!” cried Mr. Pauling. “What Englishman?”
“Tha’ English sailor man, Chief,” replied Sam.
“You don’t mean Robinson!” exclaimed Mr. Pauling. “Where is he? What
happened?”
“Yaas, Chief, tha’ officer we picked up in tha’ boat, Chief. He’s
finish, Chief. Ah don’ rightly know where he gone, but Ah’ ’spec tha’
sharks got he.”
“Suffering cats!” cried out Rawlins. “Did you knock him overboard?”
Sam grinned. “Yaas, Sir,” he replied. “Leastwise, when Ah seed he
mekkin’ to heave the young gen’man out, Ah jus’ butted he afore he
could mek to shoot an Ah ’spec Ah butted he pretty hard, fo’ he jus’
mek one good grunt an’ scooned out o’ tha’ po’t like Davy Jones was
callin’ he.”
“You old black rascal!” cried Rawlins, slapping Sam on the back. “I’ll
say you butted him good--and I’ll bet he ‘scooned.’ Why, by glory, I’d
rather be kicked by a mule than butted by that kinky head of yours.”
“Jove, but this is a mystery!” exclaimed Mr. Henderson. “The fellow
must have gone crazy suddenly. Why on earth should he wish to injure
Tom?”
“Perhaps Tom can tell us, when he comes to,” suggested Commander
Disbrow. “Ah, he’s all right, he’ll be out of his faint in a moment.”
Presently Tom’s eyes opened and he looked about, a wild,
uncomprehending expression on his face. Then, realizing that he really
was among his friends, that his father was bending over him and that
he had not been thrown into the sea, he smiled and closing his eyes,
took a long deep breath.
When again he looked up, he was fully conscious and to his father’s
anxious queries declared he felt all right except weak and that his
head ached. Then, for the first time, the others discovered the great
bruised lump upon his head and as it was being bandaged Tom told his
amazing story.
“The scoundrel!” cried Mr. Pauling. “I can’t understand it. Whom was
he talking to in the room?”
“In the room!” fairly shouted Rawlins. “Don’t you see it all, Mr.
Pauling? He was talking to those blamed ‘reds.’ The whole thing’s a
frame up. They weren’t shipwrecked at all. The _Devonshire_ never
was held up. It was all a trick and I said I had a hunch it was at the
time. They just got aboard us to give them a chance to wreck the
destroyer and get away. He put the radio sets out of commission and
left the boys’ set ’til the last so he could call to his friends.”
Before Rawlins had uttered a dozen words, the Commander had slipped
from the room and before the diver had ended he had given low-toned
orders and commands.
“By Jove, I guess you’re right!” exclaimed Mr. Pauling. “But still, we
got that cable from Trinidad this morning. The _Devonshire_ must
be there.”
Rawlins snorted. “Cable nothing!” he replied. “That was a fake--sent
by the same bunch to head us for Trinidad. Didn’t Tom hear him say
they’d fix our gear to put us on the rocks in the Bocas? Why, by
gravy, they may be hanging around within sight of us now! There never
was a _Devonshire._ They just dropped off from the sub in our
course and pretended to be adrift. I’ll bet the old sub wasn’t fifty
yards away when we took ’em aboard.”
“And we thought they’d fallen into our trap!” ejaculated Mr.
Henderson. “And we were the ones who were caught.”
“A miss is as good as a mile,” Rawlins reminded him. “And we’re not
caught yet. We’ll fool ’em still and land ’em if I have to follow them
to Kingdom Come. Say, we’d better get the rest of that bunch rounded
up before they do anything or get wise to Robinson being bumped off.”
“They’re attended to,” announced Commander Disbrow, as he reentered
the room. “Every mother’s son of them is safe in double irons.”
“Bully for you!” cried Rawlins. “Now let’s put our heads together and
see how we’ll nab the rest of the bunch.”
“There we’re up against it,” declared Mr. Pauling. “If we could make
any of the prisoners confess, we might find out their plans, although
I doubt if they know them. And we haven’t the least idea as to where
the submarine is. I think it’s about hopeless.”
“I’ll be shot if ’tis,” declared the diver. “That fake British rascal
was going to get off with a whole skin with his gang somewhere. You
can bet he wouldn’t risk his dirty neck when we went on the rocks. All
we’ve got to do is pretend to fall in with their plans, keep on for
Trinidad, and watch developments. There was some plan to get this
bunch off before we got there and we’re boobs if we can’t get on to
it.”
“Yes, no doubt you’re right,” agreed Mr. Pauling. “But still I’m
doubtful of success. The criminal always has the advantage in a case
of this sort for he knows his own plans and makes them while knowing
more or less of his pursuers’ plans and movements, whereas the
authorities know nothing of his and must go largely by guess work.
Possibly the boys might send some message--asking for further orders
or pretending the exact plans had not gone through--and so get
information.”
“No, that would give us away at once,” declared Rawlins. “They knew
the radio instruments were all disabled and that Robinson, or whatever
his real name was, intended to fix the boys’ set as soon as he was
through talking, and now if we start butting in on radio again,
they’ll shy off.”
“But what did he mean about fixing the gear and the Bocas?” asked Tom.
“The Bocas are the narrow channels leading into the Gulf of Paria from
the Caribbean,” explained the Commander. “The tide runs swiftly and
there are dangerous rocky shores on either side. If a ship’s steering
gear or engines go wrong there, she’ll pile on the rocks in a moment.
I expect the rascals planned to monkey with the steering gear--though
how I can’t imagine. I’ve a gang of machinists and engineers going
over every part of the ship now. No knowing but they may have done
something already.”
“And to think we pitied them and thought them shipwrecked sailors!”
exclaimed Frank.
“Yes, and I was fool enough to give away some of our plans,” lamented
Mr. Pauling. “No doubt that confounded faker told them all to his
friends on the sub.”
“But you didn’t tell him the secret cipher you used in notifying the
authorities,” said Mr. Henderson. “How do you imagine they discovered
it and managed to get the message to you?”
“I don’t think they did,” replied Mr. Pauling. “The cable came in in
English and I had no suspicions. As long as the _Devonshire_ and
its crew were supposedly taken, I assumed that there was no further
need for secrecy and that the officials used a plain message for that
reason.”
“Hmm, I see,” mused the other. “I wonder where it was really sent
from.”
“Probably not sent at all,” declared Rawlins. “More likely a plain
fake from beginning to end, written right in Dominica and never saw
the cable office.”
“Well, what are we going to do with this gang we’ve got in the brig?”
inquired the Commander. “Take them to Trinidad?”
“I think the best and first thing is to question them,” replied Mr.
Pauling. “By taking them one at a time we may learn something.”
Accordingly, the men were brought up, shackled and under guard, and
Mr. Pauling and Mr. Henderson, who were past masters at the art of
wringing damaging admissions from criminals, questioned each of the
surly lot at length. But all their efforts to secure information
amounted to but little. The men declared they knew nothing of the
plans of their leaders; every one maintained that the story of the
seizure of the _Devonshire_ was gospel truth and all professed
entire innocence of any wrong doing. No amount of cross questioning or
threatening shook their story and not one made a statement which
conflicted with another’s.
“They’re the most accomplished set of liars I ever ran across,”
declared Mr. Pauling, “and the worst of it is, we really haven’t an
atom of evidence or proof against them. If the _Devonshire_ never
turned up, they could claim that she had been sunk by the ‘reds’ and
our own evidence as to the past activities of the villains would lend
color to these fellows’ tale. Even the fact that Robinson plotted or
planned to destroy us or that he was in league with those on the sub
would not affect these men. They could hold that he was planted on the
_Devonshire_ and the rest of her crew knew nothing of it.”
“Yes, that’s very true,” admitted the Commander, “but I would suggest
we put into Barbados and leave this crowd there. Possibly the
Admiralty Courts may be able to hold them on some charge.”
“I would, but for the fact that if, as Rawlins thinks, the sub is
watching us, our going to Barbados would arouse their suspicions and
as long as there is a remote chance of getting the leaders I’m going
to take it,” replied Mr. Pauling.
As he finished speaking, Bancroft and the boys appeared.
“We’ve found the trouble with the radio!” cried Tom. “And it’s all
right now. They’d cut the lead-in wire where it passed through an
insulating tube and had spliced the insulation together, and on the
radio compass they’d taken out a section of wire and replaced it with
a bit of stick covered with the insulation where it was connected to a
binding post.”
“I’ll say they’re clever rascals!” exclaimed Rawlins. “Well, we can
hear any messages they send now even if we don’t want to send.”
“Personally, I’m sorry that Sam butted that man Robinson overboard,”
remarked Mr. Pauling who had been deep in thought. “He’s bobbed up
twice in the nick of time to save your life, Tom, and each time he’s
killed a man who would have been more valuable alive than dead. Not
that I blame him--I owe him a greater debt than I can ever hope to
repay--but I do wish that if he’s destined to rescue you from every
scrape you get into that he could do it without always destroying our
evidence. I’d give a great deal to have a chance to put a few
questions to that Robinson.”
“And I’ll bet my boots to a tin whistle he wouldn’t have come across
with any information,” declared Rawlins. “I’ve been putting two and
two together and I’ve a hunch he’s the chap who called himself a
‘Yank’ when the boys heard him talking on the tramp back in St. John.
He was too blamed clever to give away anything and maybe, after all,
these men _are_ telling the truth and he was planted on the
_Devonshire_ and his friends seized the ship. That would account
for their letting Robinson and a boat’s crew get away--just to board
us you see. By glory, it’s such a mixed-up plot within a plot that
it’s sure got me guessing.”
“Jove, that may be so,” cried Mr. Henderson. “If so, it would explain
several puzzles. He may have intended to escape alone and let the rest
of the crowd sink or swim with us. ’Twould have been fairly easy for
him to do that--just drop over the side and be picked up by the sub at
some prearranged spot--whereas a crowd of twenty-two men would have a
hard job to clear out undetected.”
“Well, he dropped over all right,” chuckled the diver. “Only I’ll bet
the sub wasn’t standing by to pick him up.”
“Perhaps we can solve part of the mystery when we reach Trinidad,”
said Mr. Pauling. “If the _Devonshire_ is overdue, we can be
fairly sure she was seized. Whereas if she arrives with her real
officers and crew, we’ll know it was all a frame-up. But we’ll owe an
apology to her company in that case.”
Rawlins uttered an ejaculation and springing up rushed from the room.
“Well, I wonder what’s struck him now!” exclaimed Mr. Henderson.
“Another hunch, probably,” laughed the Commander. “He seems full of
them.”
“And usually pretty near the truth at that,” put in Mr. Pauling.
Five minutes later the diver reappeared. “Some one please kick me for
a blamed dub!” he exclaimed. “Here we’ve been backing and filling and
talking and discussing and guessing and we might have found out the
truth in a minute at any time.”
“If you’ll tell us what you’re driving at, we may understand,” said
Mr. Pauling. “What’s this new discovery of yours?”
“That this bunch we’ve got on board are all blamed liars!” replied the
diver. “There isn’t any such ship as the _Devonshire_. At least
none that corresponds with their story. I’ve just gone through Lloyds’
Registry and there are only three British ships of the name. One’s a
wooden bark, the other’s a little coasting steamer and the third’s a
big liner.”
“By Jove!” ejaculated Mr. Henderson.
“You’d better kick me too!” laughed the Commander. “I’m ready to join
your boob society at any time, Rawlins. I’d hate to have the rest of
the navy hear of this. Here I’m supposed to use that registry for
looking up ships and I never thought of it when the need came.”
“Well, we’re none of us infallible,” Mr. Henderson reminded him.
“However, that’s one point settled. The next thing--”
At this instant a lieutenant dashed into the room and saluted.
“Submarine on the starboard bow!” he announced.